The disintegration of the army was only the most vivid expression of the general collapse of the corrupt, police-ridden régime. The tsarist court, which under the rule of the Romanovs had always been a hotbed of intrigue, corruption and secret assassination, now openly became an asylum for rogues and swindlers. Great influence was wielded at court by Grigori Rasputin. A peasant from the village of Pokrovskoye, the district of Tyimen (Siberia), Rasputin in his youth had wandered from monastery to monastery, frequenting the company of religious impostors, pilgrims and beggars. He soon began to “prophesy” himself and to gather hysterical subjects and epileptics around him. In his native village he was nicknamed “Grisha the Seer.” Talk of the new “holy man” reached Petrograd, where religious superstition was rife in fashionable circles. Rasputin was invited to the capital. Not without intelligence, this crafty muzhik soon adapted himself to the hypocritical atmosphere of court circles.
Aristocratic hosts vied in inviting Rasputin to their houses. He made a powerful impression on hysterical old women and jaded and bored ladies. S. P. Beletsky, Chief of the Department of Police, whose duty it was to keep an eye on the “holy man,” and who at the same time used his influence to further his own career, admitted after the Revolution that Rasputin took lessons in mesmerism. Stories of Rasputin’s “holy acts” circulated in fashionable circles. He was credited with the miraculous gift of healing. Rasputin was invited to the palace. Alexei, the heir to the throne, suffered from hæmophilia—a spontaneous bleeding—a malady against which medicine was still powerless. The superstitious tsarina resorted to the aid of pilgrims and mesmerists and would take her son to kiss holy relics. Rasputin played on the morbidity of the hysterical mother and inspired the tsarina with the belief that without his prayers the Crown Prince would die. Rasputin acquired tremendous influence at court. The Empress wrote to her husband:
“To follow our Friend’s counsel, lovey—I assure you is right. He prays so hard day and night for you—and He has kept you where you are. . . . Only one must listen, trust and ask advice—not think that he does not know. God opens everything to him.”(1)
Rasputin became an intimate at court. His apartment was always crowded with swindlers and shady businessmen. Rasputin would write illiterate requests to the Ministers to grant concessions or posts to his various acquaintances. “The tsar’s keeper of the holy lamp,” as Rasputin was nicknamed, had a finger in every appointment. When a new Minister of the Interior had to be appointed, the tsarina wrote to Nicholas:
“Beloved, A. [Vyrubova, a favourite of the tsarina and one of Rasputin’s most ardent followers.—Ed.] just saw Andronikov and Khvostov and the latter made on her an excellent impression. (. . . I not knowing him, don’t know what to say.) He is most devoted to you, spoke quietly and well about our Friend to her.”(2)
It was enough for A. N. Khvostov to praise “our Friend,” for him to be appointed to the post of Minister of the Interior.
Rasputinism gnawed at the tsarist régime like a malignant disease. But Rasputin was not the only one of his type at court. He has been given undue prominence by bourgeois historians with the object of concealing the monstrous decadence and corruption of the whole court, where flourished such types as Prince M. M. Andronikov, a speculator and promoter of all sorts of spurious enterprises and big money-making operations, such as the purchase, with the aid of Sukhomlinov, Minister of War, of irrigated lands in Central Asia. One of Rasputin’s secretaries, Manesevich-Manuylov, a secret police agent and a contributor to the reactionary newspaper the Novoye Vremya, carried on his swindling and corrupt practices with such utter shamelessness that even the police were at length obliged to interfere and arrest him. But the tsarina intervened. She wrote to Nicholas:
“On Manuylov’s paper I beg you to write ‘stop proceedings’ and send it to the Minister of Justice. Batyushin, who had to do with the whole thing, now himself comes to A. [Vyrubova—Ed.] to beg one should stop it, as he at last understood it was an ugly story got up by others to harm our Friend.”(3)
It was not Rasputin that was characteristic of the Romanov régime, but Rasputinism—superstition, fanaticism, intellectual poverty and moral corruption, of which Rasputin was only the most vivid expression.
The only way the tsarist government could think of counteracting the approaching catastrophe was to adopt new measures of repression and to intensify the already intolerably oppressive régime. The last remnants of trade union organisation were destroyed. The industrial cities were ruthlessly cleared of revolutionary “suspects.” The prisons were filled to overcrowding. But the Ministers were unable to cope with the general disruption. A constant change of Ministers began—a sort of ministerial leap frog. In the first two years of the war there were four Presidents of the Council—I. L. Goremykin, B. V. Stürmer, A. F. Trepov and N. D. Golitsyn—six Ministers of the Interior, three Ministers of War and three Ministers of Foreign Affairs. They rose to the surface, splashed about for a while, and then disappeared. “Ministerial leapfrog,” this was called. The distribution of ministerial portfolios depended on the recommendations of adventurers, on the opinion of the “Star Chamber,” as Rasputin’s circle was nicknamed. Other motives frequently operated. The tsarina wrote to Nicholas requesting him to appoint Stürmer President of the Council and said of the new candidate that “his head is plenty fresh enough.”(4) N. A. Maklakov, according to his own admission, was appointed Minister of the Interior for the following reason; after the assassination of Stolypin, Nicholas left Kiev for Chernigov, where Maklakov was governor; “the weather was splendid and he was in an excellent and cheerful mood.”(5) The governor earned the good graces of the tsar. Maklakov became an indispensable figure in court circles. He could crow like a cock and imitate a “lovesick panther” and other animals. These clownish propensities were sufficient to earn him a ministerial portfolio.
Neither the frequent changes of Ministers, nor the “night and day” prayers of “our Friend” were of any avail. The spirit of revolution steadily spread among the population and the army. The old contradictions flared up with new vigour, creating and multiplying the elements of a revolutionary situation.
The general disruption was strongly reflected in the food crisis of the autumn of 1916. Consignments of grain rapidly declined. Petrograd received only one-third of the daily number of carloads of grain to which it was entitled. Huge lines formed at the food shops. People would line up long before daybreak, or wait the whole night through; but in the morning only a part of the line would be fortunate enough to secure a miserable starvation ration. The endless food lines served as mass meetings and acted as a substitute for revolutionary handbills. In the food lines the news of the day would be exchanged. Agitators would frequently come forward and explain where the responsibility for the food shortage lay. Unrest spread rapidly among the masses. On October 18, 1916, the Chief of Gendarmes of the City of Perm reported:
“Minds have become alarmed: it requires only a jolt for the population, indignant at the high prices, to pass to open expressions of indignation.”(6)
The Moscow Chief of Secret Police reported on October 20:
“In the days of crisis the intensity of feeling among the masses in Moscow is reaching such a pitch that one may expect it to lead to a series of grave excesses.”(7)
The government made an attempt to appease the people. Count A. A. Bobrinsky, Minister of Agriculture, published an explanation; but the interview he gave the newspapers only served to stimulate further unrest. The people learnt that the food policy was being determined by a big landowner, a sugar refiner, a millionaire, a man alien and hostile to the people.
By the autumn of 1916 the Bolshevik party, despite a number of arrests that deprived it of some of its most prominent leaders (thirty persons, among them members of the Petrograd Committee, had been arrested quite recently, on the night of July 20, 1916), had succeeded in reforming its organisations and developing widespread activity. Bolshevik groups revived in the factories. Individual groups combined to form district organisations. Revolutionary literature was distributed more widely. In the middle of October a leaflet entitled “To the Proletariat of St. Petersburg” appeared in the capital. In this leaflet the Petrograd Committee of the Bolshevik Party stated:
“Life is becoming harder every day. . . . The criminal war . . . apart from the millions of killed, and mutilated . . . is the cause of other misfortunes as well . . . the food shortage and the resulting high prices. The frightful spectre of ‘King Hunger’ . . . is again menacing Europe. . . . Enough of suffering in patience and silence! . . . If you want to stop the high prices and to escape the impending famine you must fight the war, you must fight the whole system of violence and plunder.”(8)
The Party’s appeal fell on receptive soil. On October 17 a strike broke out in the Renault Works on the Vyborg Side. The Workers marched to other factories. Very soon the Sampsonievsky Prospect was filled with demonstrators. Outside the barracks of the 181st Regiment the police wanted to arrest an agitator, but were prevented by the crowd. Soldiers ran out of the barracks and began to hurl stones at the police. The colonel of the regiment was summoned. The excited workers and soldiers smashed his automobile and injured the colonel. Late that night the officers called out the non-commissioned officers’ training corps of the regiment. It barred the barracks off from the demonstrators, but refused to fire on the crowd although it was three times commanded to shoot. Mounted Cossacks arrived, but they were apparently afraid of the armed soldiers. The workers went to call out other factories. On the following days the strike had spread to the majority of the factories on the Vyborg Side. The strike lasted about four days.
A trial of sailors arrested on a charge of forming a Bolshevik organisation in the Baltic Fleet was due to be held on October 25 or 26. The Bolsheviks called upon the proletarians of Petrograd to protest against this tsarist trial. On October 25 thousands of workers came out on to the streets of the capital singing songs and carrying placards demanding, “Down with the War!” “No Death Penalty!” The police were unable to break up the demonstration. All that day meetings were held in various parts of the city. A total of about 187,000 workers went on strike in October in various parts of the country, which was four times more than in the previous month (47,000), and several times more than in any earlier month of the war. But the point was not merely that the strike movement was growing. The October strikes bore a marked political character and were led by the Bolshevik Party, the party which the police thought had been completely smashed. The Chief of the Department of Police bragged that the Bolshevik Party had been destroyed in a belated report to the Minister of the Interior. On October 30, while the Minister was reading the report that the Bolshevik Party had been smashed, there lay before him an account of a new strike and demonstration of a size unknown since 1914. What particularly alarmed the ruling classes was that the workers had begun to draw the soldiers into the movement.
The bourgeoisie sensed the approaching storm and began to make urgent appeals to the autocracy. The bourgeoisie now needed the autocracy not only to wage the war to a victorious finish, but also to combat revolution. The Cadets witnessed the rapid development of the revolution with alarm. A meeting of the Moscow Committee of the Cadet Party was held on September 23, at which Kishkin, a prominent Cadet leader, argued that the inefficient government had driven the country to revolution. Kishkin hoped that this would force the government into the arms of the Cadets and compel the autocracy to make concessions. A conference of the Cadet Party was held in Moscow on October 23 and 24, 1916. Even the secret police agents present at the conference testified to its “inordinate fear of the revolution.” Milyukov warned against encouraging “revolutionary instincts.”
“Our task will be not to finish off the government, which would mean encouraging anarchy, but to give it an entirely new content, that is, establish a firm, legal, constitutional system. That is why in spite of everything a sense of proportion is essential in fighting the government.”(9)
This was the way the Cadets spoke, and the entire Progressive Bloc in the Duma adopted a similar position. These recent oppositionists now talked not of fighting the government in the interests of the war, but of helping the government to fight the revolution. But the monarchy could no longer cope with either task. The severe defeats at the front showed that tsarism was incapable of waging a successful war. The growing disintegration showed that it was incapable of leading the country out of the impasse. As soon as the extent and character of the Petrograd strike of October 25 and 26 became known the bourgeoisie adopted a firmer tone. Shulgin, a Right deputy, said in the State Duma on November 3:
“We would, so to speak, have preserved patience to the very limit. And the only reason we are now severely condemning this government quite frankly and openly, the only reason why we are raising the standard of battle against it, is because we have indeed reached the limit, because things have occurred which it is impossible to tolerate any longer.”(10)
At this same session of the Duma, the Cadet Maklakov declared:
“Gentlemen, we cannot co-operate with this government any longer; we can only hinder it, as it will hinder us. But co-operation has become absolutely impossible, and let them choose between us and this government.”(11)
Somewhat earlier—on November 1—Milyukov had spoken in the Duma. Citing a number of facts in illustration of the inefficient and corrupt practices of the government, Milyukov each time asked: “What is this—stupidity or treason?”(12) The leader of the Cadets sharply criticised Stürmer, the President of the Council, and accused him of betraying Russia’s interests. Milyukov spoke of the “dark forces” surrounding the throne.(13) He referred in very cautious terms to treason in high spheres, hinting at the Empress, whom rumour accused of sympathy with the Germans. The burden of Milyukov’s speech was that the government was not in a condition to fight the war to a victorious finish. S. Shidlovsky made an official statement in the name of the entire Progressive Bloc:
“We are today again raising our voices, but this time not to warn of the impending danger, but to say that the government as at present constituted is not in a position to cope with this danger . . . and must make way for persons united by a common conception of the tasks of the present moment and prepared to look for support in their activities to the majority in the State Duma and to carry out its programme.”(14)
The bourgeoisie now demanded not a “Cabinet of Confidence,” but a cabinet fully responsible to the Duma. In the opinion of the leaders of the opposition, such a government would be able to crush the revolution and prosecute the war.
However sharply the bourgeoisie attacked the autocracy, it nevertheless stressed the point that the acuteness of the conflict was due to the menace of revolution. That is what Shulgin said in the Duma:
“Such a conflict is the only way of avoiding what is perhaps most to be feared, the only way of avoiding anarchy and governmental chaos.”(15)
The action of the Progressive Bloc met with support even among the extreme Rights. Purishkevich severely criticised the government and the “dark forces” governing the country.(16) Even the Privy Council, which was recruited from persons thoroughly devoted to the throne—even this chamber of reactionary dignitaries adopted a resolution on November 22 advocating the formation of a new cabinet.(17) Even the Congress of the United Nobility began to speak of the “dark forces” and of the necessity for a new government. True, the nobles state that the new cabinet should be responsible only to the monarch,(18) but even in this form the resolution of the congress was indicative of a split between the ruling circles and a section of their class. In the autumn of 1915 the Progressive Bloc had been greeted with violent hostility by people who now, in the autumn of 1916 were seconding its demands—so shaky had the ground beneath the feet of the ruling classes of the country become.
The autocracy was faced with a dilemma: either to continue the war and face a revolt of the workers and peasants, or to make peace with the Germans and thus mitigate the revolutionary discontent. In the latter case, the tsarist government would encounter the resistance of the bourgeoisie, for which the war was an inexhaustible source of profit and a means of conquering new markets. The tsar and his entourage decided to end the war, on the assumption that after all it would be easier to cope with the revolt of the masses.
But they thought it too risky to announce their intentions openly: bourgeois circles were in too excited a state, and, what is more, the Allies had for a long time been watching the policy of the autocracy with growing distrust.
The Russian bourgeoisie had attempted several times during the course of the war to complain to the British and French imperialists of the restrictions placed on “patriotic” work. Foreign capitalists, of course, were interested in the Russian army, without which there could be no question of a victory over Germany, but they were not interested in the army alone. A number of branches of Russian industry—such as iron and steel and chemicals—to a large extent belonged to foreign capitalists. It was in the interest of the British and French bourgeoisie that the profitable “work for defence purposes” should proceed uninterrupted. At the end of March 1916 Rodzyanko was invited by the governments of Great Britain, France and Italy to send a delegation of Duma deputies to study the munitions industry in foreign countries. A number of Duma deputies, including Milyukov and Protopopov, went abroad in the spring of 1916. On the other hand, representatives of foreign governments visited Russia in April 1916. Among them were Albert Thomas, a prominent figure in the Second International, and Viviani—both “Socialists” and members of the French cabinet. Nicholas was carefully coached for the meeting with these delegations. He was assured that although they were “Socialists” they were devoting all their energies to the defence of their imperialist fatherland. Here is a description of one of them given by Poincaré, the French Premier who, because of his extreme imperialist policy was nicknamed Poincaré la guerre, “War Poincaré”:
“. . . M. Albert Thomas, Assistant Secretary of State and Minister of Munitions, has supervised in France with remarkable ability and indefatigable zeal the manufacture of artillery and shells . . . He has contributed to the development in France of an industry which, unfortunately, was and still is much too limited in all the Allied countries. He has for this purpose united in a common effort the initiative of the State and private industry; he has secured the loyal support of the employers and workers; and for several months now all the productive forces of the country have been working to increase our military supplies. . . .”(19)
This was a certificate of faithful service to imperialism granted to the whole Second International.
Albert Thomas came to Russia to secure an improvement in the munitions industry and the dispatch of 400,000 Russian soldiers to France. Thomas and Viviani remained in Russia until May 17, 1916. They visited munitions factories, conversed with big capitalists and generals and with the Emperor, and strove for the removal of all obstacles in the work of the war industries. The French “Socialists” attempted also to appeal to the workers, but such was the reception they met with that Thomas considered it expedient to advise the tsar to take special measures against the workers. According to Paléologue, Albert Thomas said to B. Stürmer, President of the Council:
“Your factories are not working enough; they could produce ten times as much. You should militarise your workers.”(20)
The leaders of the Second International advised the Russian tsar, who was already notorious for his savage exploitation of the proletariat, to turn the workers into military slaves.
Sir George Buchanan, the British Ambassador to Russia, spoke several times to Nicholas of the serious state of the country. The more defeats Russia suffered, the more insistent became the “advice” of the British Ambassador. Buchanan literally harassed the tsar, drawing his attention to every minute fact that might be interpreted as prejudicial to England. The conduct of the British Ambassador in Russia differed very little from the conduct of his colleague in a country like Siam. These constant admonitions finally exhausted Nicholas’ patience. He had been accustomed to receive the Ambassador without formality, but now he received him in full-dress uniform, a hint to Buchanan that he must observe a strictly official tone and refrain from giving “advice.” The hint was unavailing. Quite the contrary Buchanan now began to resort to open threats. When Nicholas replaced S. D. Sazonov, the Foreign Minister, by B. V. Stürmer, who was reputed to favour peace with Germany, Buchanan telegraphed to London:
“. . . He [Stürmer—Ed.] is, according to all accounts, a Germanophile at heart. As a pronounced reactionary, he is, moreover, at one with the Empress in wishing to maintain the autocracy intact . . . If the Emperor continues to uphold his present reactionary advisers a revolution is, I fear, inevitable.”(21)
Buchanan’s French colleague expressed himself even more sharply on the subject of Nicholas’ policy. Maurice Paléologue often compares himself in his memoirs, to Chetardi, the French Ambassador, who in the eighteenth century helped Elizabeth to take the Russian throne from Anna. Sazonov’s dismissal moved Paléologue to another historical comparison. The French Ambassador records in his diary a conversation he had with the Grand Duchess Maria Pavlovna:
“‘What is to be done? . . . For fifteen days we have all been making every effort to prove to him [i.e., Nicholas II—Ed.] that he is ruining the dynasty, that he is ruining Russia, that his reign . . . is about to end in a catastrophe. He will not listen. It is tragical! . . . We shall, however, attempt a collective appeal by the Imperial Family. . . .’
“‘Will it be confined to a . . . platonic appeal?’
“We gaze at each other in silence. She divines that I am referring to the drama of Paul I, because she replies with a gesture of horrors:
‘My God! What is going to happen? . . .’”(22)
The Ambassador did not balk at the idea of regicide when it seemed to him that Nicholas was not staunch enough in his loyalty to the Allies.
Under such circumstances the autocracy had to pursue its plans with the greatest caution. On November 10 the tsar dismissed Stürmer, who was being accused of treason, and appointed A. F. Trepov President of the Council. Trepov was a brother of the Governor-General of St. Petersburg who in the 1905 Revolution had issued the notorious order: “Spare no bullets!” He was the son of the Governor of the City of St. Petersburg who was fired on by Vera Zasulich on January 24, 1878. Trepov was a large land-owner in the province of Poltava. He had been connected with certain members of the Duma in his earlier work in the government. On November 19 the new Prime Minister presented himself to the Duma and at once announced that the Allies would hand over Constantinople to Russia. He added:
“The Russian people ought to know for what they are shedding their blood.”(23)
This was pleasant news to the landlords and the bourgeois.
It was thought that such concessions would temporarily appease the excited deputies and that subsequently a different course could be adopted. When appointing Trepov, who was distrusted at the court, Nicholas reassured the tsarina:
“It is a rotten business to have to do with a man whom one dislikes and mistrusts. . . . But first of all one must choose a new successor and then kick him out, after he has done the dirty business. I mean—send him away, when he has shut up the Duma. Let all the responsibility and difficulty fall on his shoulders and not on those of the newcomer.”(24)
The conspiracy of the tsarist clique was as follows. It was proposed to prohibit the “Unions,” as the bourgeois organisations were called in government circles, to disperse the Duma and to elect a new, “tame” Duma, to concentrate the whole power of government in the hands of one “plenipotentiary person,” to conclude a separate peace with Germany and then to tackle the revolution.
Tentative efforts to arrive at a peace with Germany had been undertaken long before. As early as 1915, when the Russian armies were in full flight from Galicia, letters were received in Petrograd from M. A. Vassilchikova, a lady-in-waiting to the Russian Empress, writing from Austria, where she had taken up permanent residence on her estate. Like many other members of Russian upper circles, Vassilchikova was related to a number of German aristocrats and Russian dignitaries. She was also known at court. Vassilchikova wrote three letters to Nicholas proposing peace in the name of Wilhelm II, and in December she herself made her way to the Russian capital with the object of obtaining an audience from the tsar. Rumours of a separate peace began to spread in society, and Vassilchikova had to be sent out of the capital. In April 1915 the tsarina received a letter from her brother, the Duke of Hesse, proposing that peace negotiations be started. Without awaiting a reply, the Duke sent a confidential agent to Stockholm to meet any representatives the tsar might send. The tsarina wrote to Nicholas about her brother as follows:
“So he had an idea of quite privately sending a man of confidence to Stockholm, who should meet a gentleman sent by you (privately) that they could help disperse many momentary difficulties. So he sent a gentleman to be there on the 28th (that is two days ago, and I only heard to-day), and can only spare him a week. So I at once wrote an answer . . . and sent it to the gentleman telling him you are not yet back, so he had better not wait, and that though one longs for peace the time has not yet come.”(25)
The fate of nations was decided by the tsar’s relatives in this domestic way.
In 1916 several other attempts were made to start peace negotiations with Germany. In July a meeting was held in Stockholm between Warburg, a German representative, and Protopopov, Vice-President of the Duma, while the latter was abroad with a delegation of Duma deputies. At this meeting Warburg outlined the terms on which Germany would be willing to conclude peace.
On his return to Russia, Protopopov made a report on the meeting to members of the Duma. Nicholas learnt of Protopopov’s meeting in Stockholm and immediately summoned him to the palace. As Milyukov admitted, it was greatly feared in the Duma “that this proposal [i.e., Warburg’s—Ed.] might be taken seriously.” Milyukov requested Protopopov to regard the whole incident “as the chance episode of a tourist and to put it in this way” to Nicholas.(26) But evidently, Protopopov knew how to curry favour with the tsar. “I felt that he was very pleased with my report,”(27) Protopopov related in the course of the interrogation after the 1917 Revolution. He was not mistaken. On September 18, on Rasputin’s recommendation, Protopopov was appointed Acting Minister of the Interior. Nicholas had a two-fold purpose in making this appointment. Protopopov, an Octobrist, and Vice-President of the Duma, was the Chairman of the Council of the Congresses of the Metallurgical Industry, which meant that he had close contacts with industrial circles. He was a big landowner—he owned about 13,000 acres of land in the province of Simbirsk. The tsar believed that by appointing Protopopov Minister he was erecting a bridge to the bourgeoisie. On the other hand, Protopopov—a protégé of Rasputin’s—had shown that he favoured a separate peace, which made him a convenient instrument of the tsar’s policy.
Protopopov’s appointment earned him the hatred of his former friends in the Duma. Protopopov was abused and slandered and spoken of with greater contempt than the other Ministers. This was not because of his personal qualities—Protopopov was no worse than the other creatures of the tsarist clique—but because he had consented to become a Minister at a time when the Duma was in conflict with Nicholas, and especially because of his views on peace.
Having freed its hands in the sphere of foreign policy the autocracy rapidly began to carry out its plans within the country itself. On December 9 the Congresses of the Union of the Cities and of the Union of the Zemstvos were closed down. The most innocent meetings, politically, were prohibited; on December 11 a meeting of the Society of Journalists, and later a meeting of the Society of Children’s Doctors were forbidden.
Bourgeois organisations inundated the Duma with protests; but on December 17 the tsar suspended the meetings of the Duma until January 12. It was hoped in the interval to complete the preparations for the election of a new Duma. The details of the plan had been drawn up as early as October 1915 by A. N. Khvostov, a former Minister of the Interior. Khvostov had been Governor of Vologda and Nizhni Novgorod, where he succeeded in getting Rights elected to the Duma. It was to this “election expert” that the task of drawing up a plan was entrusted. Eight million rubles were placed at the disposal of the Minister for the purpose of bribing the press, issuing literature, hiring printshops and organising street displays and cinema shows. Khvostov managed to receive about 1,500,000 rubles, for the disbursal of which he was unable after the Revolution to produce any vouchers. A large part of this sum found its way into the pocket of the Minister himself. Khvostov drew up a memorandum on the probable outcome of the elections in each province. In respect to the composition of the future Duma, the memorandum stated:
“Right Octobrists are permissible groups and more conservative are desirable.”(28)
Deputies of the type of Rodzyanko were to be allowed into the new Duma, but Markov 2nd and similar members of the Union of the Russian People were deemed desirable. It was hoped to achieve these results with the aid of the landed nobility and the priests. For example, in reference to the province of Tver the memorandum stated:
“Definite Rights, in alliance with the clergy, should be set up against the Lefts and the Octobrists.”(29)
Of the Tambov Province it was stated:
“The Left groups can be rendered harmless only with the aid of the clergy. They are not very reliable, but they could be taken in hand by the bishop, who must instruct them not to allow the election of Lefts.”(30)
When it came to putting the plan into practical effect, N. A. Maklakov, the man who could give such a good imitation of a “lovesick panther,” was called to mind. Nicholas II instructed him, in conjunction with Protopopov, who in December had been endorsed as Minister of the Interior, to draw up a manifesto proroguing the Duma. Rejoicing at the fact that he had been summoned from imitating a panther to more “useful” work, Maklakov wrote a letter of gratitude to the tsar, from which we learn how extensive the tsar’s plan was. Maklakov wrote:
“This should be a matter for the Ministerial Council as a whole, and the Minister of the Interior must not be left to fight single-handed the whole of Russia, which has been led astray. The government, more than ever before, must be concentrated, convinced, knit by a single purpose, namely, to restore order in the state at all costs, and it must be convinced of victory over the internal enemy, who has for a long time been growing more dangerous, more savage and more arrogant than the foreign enemy.”(31)
This idea that the internal enemy, i.e., their subjects, was more dangerous than the foreign enemy, dominated all the activities of the court clique.
The conspiracy of the autocracy was ready for execution.
It is important to note that Maklakov wrote his letter on February 9, and that on February 13 Count Czernin, the Austrian Foreign Minister, had already received peace proposals from Russia. This is what Count Czernin writes:
“On February 26 [new style—Ed.] a person came to see me who produced proof that he was the appointed representative of a certain neutral Power, and informed me, at the request of his government, that he was instructed to let me know that the enemy Powers, or at least one of them, were prepared to conclude peace with us and that the terms of the peace would be favourable to us. . . . I did not doubt for a moment that Russia was in question, and my interlocutor confirmed my assumption.”(32)
The autocracy persisted in its adopted course.
The first vague news of a change in the foreign policy of the tsarist court roused the bourgeoisie to fury. The bourgeoisie had the full support of Russia’s imperialist allies. If Russia were to conclude a separate peace, victory over Germany would be placed in doubt. The Russian army engaged the attention of tremendous forces of the enemy, and if it were to quit the war the plans of the Allied imperialists would be completely upset.
Supported by the Allies, the Russian bourgeoisie decided to infuse new blood into the decrepit autocracy by means of a palace revolution—to depose the incompetent tsar and to replace him by a creature of the bourgeoisie. The whole plan was designed with the purpose of intensifying resistance to the growing revolution without stopping the war. Two secret circles were formed in the capital. The first consisted mostly of military men, officers of the Guard. A prominent part in this circle was played by General Krymov, who after the Revolution was to gain notoriety for his part in the revolt of General Kornilov.
In his reminiscences of General Krymov, Tereshchenko, who became a Minister in the first government formed after the Revolution of February 1917, wrote:
“He and his friends realised that if they did not assume the leadership of the coup d’état, it would be carried out by the people themselves, and they were fully cognizant of the consequences and the fatal anarchy this might involve.
“But more cautious persons argued that the hour had not yet arrived. January passed, and the first half of February. At length, the wise words of the skilled politician failed to convince us and, in the code we used for communicating with each other, General Krymov was called to Petrograd from Rumania in the early days of March. But it was already too late.”(33)
Rodzyanko states in his memoirs that the negotiations took place in the home of Guchkov. The financial and industrial magnates knew that the conspiracy had the approval of Generals Alexeyev, Ruzsky and Brussilov. Similar work was being carried on simultaneously by officers of the Petrograd regiments of the Guards. Purishkevich also had contacts with the officers.
The second circle consisted of members of the Duma. After the Revolution of February 1917 Milyukov admitted that:
“A large number of the members of the First Provisional Government took part in the conference of this second circle, while some of them . . . also knew of the existence of the first circle.”(34)
The intention of the conspirators was to depose Nicholas, consign the tsarina to a convent, to crown Alexei (who was still a minor) tsar and to appoint Grand Duke Michael, the tsar’s brother, regent until Alexei came of age. The first step in the palace revolution was to be the assassination of Rasputin. On the night of December 17 Rasputin was invited to the apartment of Prince Felix Yusupov, where Purishkevich, Yusupov and the Grand Duke Dmitri fired six shots at the “holy man” and killed him.
The high-placed conspirators, who belonged to the same circle that created and fostered Rasputinism, cherished the secret hope that after this assassination the court would come to its senses. Nicholas’ relatives appealed to him, pointing out that he was driving to his own ruin and to the ruin of his family. But the tsar left General Headquarters and hastened to the capital, where it was decided to proceed with the execution of the plan. Only one amendment was introduced at Protopopov’s suggestion, namely, that the Duma should not be prorogued for the present. On January 6 Nicholas issued a ukase postponing the resumption of the sessions of the Duma and of the Privy Council until February 14. What they feared was not so much the indignation of the upper bourgeoisie as the rapid spread of revolutionary feeling among the masses. In Protopopov’s opinion the dispersion of the Duma might serve as a legitimate pretext for action on the part of the masses.
According to the chief organ of the Cadet Party, Ryech, the Duma members interpreted the new postponement as the culmination of the government’s campaign against the Duma. The bourgeois conspirators, for their part, again expedited their preparations. Rodzyanko learnt from a private conversation with the President of the Council that Nicholas had already signed three ukases, without, however, setting a date for their promulgation: the first definitely proroguing the Duma, the second postponing its sessions until the end of the war, and the third postponing its labours for an indefinite period. The Chairman of the Duma sent telegrams to Bazilyevsky, the Marshal of Nobility of the Moscow Province, A. D. Samarin, Chairman of the Congress of the United Nobility, and Somov, Marshall of Nobility of the Petrograd Province, summoning them to Petrograd. A message was sent summoning to Moscow Prince G. E. Lvov, of the Union of Zemstvos, who more than anybody else was being mentioned as probable Prime Minister of the new government, M. V. Chelnokov of the Union of Cities and A. J. Konovalov of the Congress of Industrialists and Manufacturers. It was decided that Samarin should request an audience of the tsar in the name of the nobility and endeavour to open his eyes to the true state of affairs. It was proposed to summon the Congress of the United Nobility on January 19. Furthermore, as Guchkov subsequently stated during his examination by the Investigation Commission after the February Revolution, the secret circle decided in February 1917—
“to seize the imperial train on its way from General Headquarters to Tsarskoye Selo, force the tsar to abdicate, at the same time to arrest the existing government with the aid of troops, which here in Petrograd could be relied upon, and then to announce both the coup d’état and the names of the persons who would head the government. Thus . . . not the whole army would have to be dealt with, but only a very small part of it.”(35)
The allied diplomats, like the leaders of the Russian bourgeoisie, believed that only a coup d’état could prevent a revolution and “save” Russia. The British Ambassador, Sir George Buchanan, admits in his memoirs that the conspirators discussed the coup at his Embassy.
“A Palace revolution,” he writes in his memoirs, “was openly spoken of, and at a dinner at the Embassy a Russian friend of mine, who had occupied a high position in the government, declared that it was a mere question whether both the Emperor and Empress or only the latter would be killed.”(36)
Such was the conspiracy of the nobility and the upper bourgeoisie.
This admission may be regarded as proof not only that Buchanan was aware of the conspiracy but that he himself had a hand in it. It cannot be questioned that the Ambassador of an allied Power who was informed of the likelihood of the assassination of the Emperor to whom he was accredited and yet did not make the conspirator known, had a hand in the conspiracy. Sir George Buchanan frankly relates that—
“a Russian friend of mine, who was afterwards a member of the Provisional Government, sent me a message . . . to say that there would be a revolution before Easter.”(37)
The two conspiracies—both designed to prevent revolution—were now ripe. The conspirators hastened to carry out their plans without the aid of the masses and before the people could detect their policy. But the revolution forestalled both the blow of the autocracy and the palace revolution: while the bourgeoisie and the autocracy were engrossed with each other, the workers and peasants, who hated both the bourgeoisie and tsarism, came out on to the streets in open action.
The strike wave of October 1916 was succeeded by a relative calm in the working-class movement, but neither in November nor in December did the number of strikes fall below 40,000. A rapid upward movement began in 1917. The severe winter had entailed fresh hardships on the working population. Deliveries of grain to Petrograd and Moscow had almost entirely ceased. Prices of articles of general consumption rose rapidly. Voices of protest were more and more frequently heard in the food lines.
Several baker shops had already been wrecked. The women were particularly active. In January reports of the secret police to the Minister of the Interior stated:
“Mothers of families, exhausted by endless waiting in the lines at the shops and suffering at the sight of their half-starved and sick children, are perhaps nearer to revolution than Messrs. Milyukov, Rodichev and Co., and are, of course, much more dangerous, because they represent a powder magazine which requires only a spark to explode.”(38)
Strikes in January began on the 9th, the anniversary of the shooting down of the demonstrating workers in 1905. The day before the Petrograd Committee of the Bolshevik Party had appealed to the workers to demonstrate against the war. The Bureau of the Bolshevik Central Committee gave similar instructions in Moscow. On January 9 meetings were organised by the workers in many factories. They appeared in the streets with red flags. In the Vyborg and Narva Districts of Petrograd nearly all the factories were at a standstill. Demonstrations of workers were held in Petrograd, Moscow, Baku and Nizhni Novgorod. In Moscow one-third of the workers went on strike. The Moscow Bolshevik Committee organised a demonstration on Tverskoi Boulevard which was attended by about 2,000 persons and which was broken up by mounted police. Towards 3 p.m. a group of workers appeared on Theatre Square with red banners bearing the slogan: “Down with the War!” The number of demonstrators rapidly grew to about a thousand. They marched towards the Okhotny Ryad. Mounted police arrived and rode into the crowd with unsheathed sabres. Everywhere the police dealt brutally with the strikers. Arrests were made. Many workers were handed over to the military authorities. But a few days later the strikes brokes [sic] out afresh. In January a total of over 200,000 workers went on strike in various parts of the country. Strikes of this magnitude had been unknown since the outbreak of the war. The situation in Petrograd and Moscow became extremely tense. The cities were rife with rumours. The townsfolk hoarded food in the event of traffic coming to a standstill.
“The idea of a general strike,” the police reported, “is acquiring more supporters every day and is becoming as popular as it was in 1905.”(39)
The movement in the towns was joined by a movement among the poor peasants in the countryside. Continuous mobilisation and perpetual requisitions of cattle had completely ruined large numbers of the working peasants. The industrial crisis had deprived the villages of matches, kerosene and salt. The peasants had barely enough grain to last even to mid-winter. Hatred of the landowner and the kulak grew more intense than ever. News of a vigorous movement against the war was received from a number of districts.
“The government cannot hang all of us, but the Germans can kill or cripple everybody,”(40) it was said in the villages as an argument in favour of not appearing when called up for the army. The police reports on the state of feeling among the peasants contained frequent comparisons with the state of feeling that prevailed in 1905 and 1906.
The tsarist government definitely refused to make any concessions either to the liberal bourgeoisie or to those court cliques who were prepared to affect liberalism at a moment of danger. Tsarism mobilised all its forces. The police were armed with machine guns taken from the garrison and the secret police were set in motion to arrest “all suspicious persons.” Arrests were made frequently without discriminating between friend and foe. On the night of January 27 the members of the Labour Group of the Central War Industry Committee—the Mensheviks Gvozdyev, Broydo and others, eleven persons in all—were arrested. They were accused of making preparations for a workers’ demonstration on February 14 “with the object of converting Russia into a Social-Democratic republic.”(41)
On February 5 an order was issued separating the Petrograd Military Area from the Northern Front. Lieut.-General S. S. Khabalov, the Commander of the Area, was endowed with wide powers. The government decided to fight the revolution ruthlessly.
The first signs of the revolutionary storm caused utter dismay in the ranks of the liberal bourgeoisie. All talk of a palace revolution ceased. The “revolutionaries despite themselves” had been prepared to make a chamber revolution without the masses, but the masses suddenly appeared on the streets. The Duma chatterers refused to hear of any further pressure being brought to bear on the autocracy. These recent conspirators betrayed even their nearest allies. The day following the arrest of the Labour Group, a meeting of the Bureau of the Central War Industry Committee was held at which A. I. Guchkov and A. I. Konovalov were instructed to request the government to mitigate the lot of the arrested persons. An excellent testimonial was given to the Mensheviks:
“There are a number of facts which show that, thanks to the influence exercised by the Labour Group, acute conflicts between the workers and the managements were averted in a number of factories in various districts.”(42)
But no decisive measures were taken. On the contrary, at the following meeting of the Bureau of the Committee, held on January 29, at which leaders of the Duma opposition were present, Milyukov cynically dissociated himself from the activities of the Labour Group and spoke against “giving rein to the instincts of the masses.” Professor Milyukov pleaded with the workers not to come out on to the streets and not to give way to “provocation.” He even appealed to them to refrain from taking part in the demonstration which the Mensheviks were preparing to organise on the day of the opening of the Duma—February 14. While dissuading the workers from action, the bourgeoisie implored the tsar to meet the State Duma half way; they hoped by small concessions to forestall more radical demands on the part of the people.
The manœuvres of the scared bourgeoisie were screened by the petty-bourgeois parties. In the opinion of the Mensheviks the bourgeoisie was the only class that could lead the bourgeois revolution. The bourgeoisie had to be slightly jolted all the time to make it do so. The Mensheviks called upon the workers to demonstrate in the streets on February 14 in defence of the Duma. The demonstrators were advised to assemble at the Taurida Palace, where the Duma held its sessions. At the conference on January 29 at which Milyukov was present, Chkheidze also spoke. The Menshevik leader reproached the bourgeois leader for lagging in the tail of events.
“This is a blow at the working class, but bear in mind that the doom of the workers will be followed by your own doom,”(43)
Chkheidze said, trying to scare the bourgeoisie and urging it to wage a more determined fight against the tsar. The legal central organisations of the Mensheviks, as represented by the Labour Group and the Menshevik fraction in the state Duma, endeavoured to extinguish the revolutionary conflagration. When it became clear that the strike was assuming the form of an armed insurrection the Mensheviks appealed to the workers to refrain not only from resorting to arms but also from holding demonstrations.
The Socialist-Revolutionary groups also played the part of traitors to the revolution. Kerensky appealed to the bourgeoisie to display greater boldness. After the Duma was opened, he said:
“If you are with the country, if you realise that the old power and its servitors cannot save Russia from the present crisis, you must definitely declare and prove yourselves to be in favour of the immediate emancipation of the State, and you must proceed at once from words to deeds.”(44)
Like Chkheidze, Kerensky believed that the bourgeoisie was really capable of fighting the autocracy. The Socialist-Revolutionaries, like the Mensheviks, pleaded with the bourgeoisie to take charge of the movement and thereby avert a revolutionary storm.
The February Revolution found the Bolshevik Party weakened organisationally. Many of its organisations had been destroyed by the police. Its most prominent and active members were in exile or prison, or obliged to live abroad. Lenin was forced to bide his time in Switzerland. Stalin was in exile in a distant part of Siberia, in Turukhansk in the Yenisei region, where Sverdlov had also been banished.
But the autocracy had not succeeded in smashing the Bolshevik Party. Nor had it succeeded in severing its contacts with the masses. Faithful to the fundamental principle of Marxism—always with the masses and at the head of the masses—the Bolsheviks self-sacrificingly led the fight of the proletariat, whether at the front or in the rear, in the capital or in the provinces. New comrades, new reinforcements, took the place of the Bolsheviks condemned to prison or to exile, and penal servitude. The Bolsheviks even managed to preserve their central organisation in Russia—the Bureau of the Central Committee, one of the leaders of which was V. M. Molotov. The heroic work of the Bolshevik Party bore fruit, despite the unprecedented fury of the terror. Advanced workers, trained in the spirit of Bolshevism, brought a passionate revolutionary spirit to the day-to-day political struggle. Bolshevik ideas were a potent influence among the working class and stimulated the people to wage an irreconcilable fight against the class enemies. The Bolsheviks alone called upon the masses to overthrow tsarism by means of an armed struggle.
In opposition to the Mensheviks, who invited the workers to demonstrate in defence of the Duma on the day of its opening, the Bolsheviks made preparations for a demonstration on February 10, the anniversary of the trial of the Bolshevik fraction in the Duma. The Petrograd Committee of the Bolshevik Party had distributed leaflets on February 6 calling on the workers to demonstrate. On February 10 some of the factories were idle and some worked only until the dinner hour. Meetings were held; the Party distributed 10,000 leaflets. The Bolsheviks decided to take part in the strike of February 14 and to run it under their own slogans. On that day sixty Petrograd factories, employing scores of thousands of workers, went on strike. The workers of the Putilov Works came out with red flags inscribed with the words: “Down with the Autocracy! Down with the War!” The workers from the Vyborg District marched along the Liteiny Prospect singing revolutionary songs. Police who tried to interfere were repulsed. Meetings were held at factories.
None of the banners in the demonstration bore the slogan “Defend the Duma!” The Bolsheviks led both the strike and the demonstration.
[1] Letter of December 5, 1916.—Trans.
[2] Letter of August 29, 1915.—Trans.
[3] Letter of December 10, 1916.—Trans.
[4] Letter of January 7, 1916—Trans.
[5] Fall of the Tsarist Régime. Stenographic Report of the Interrogation and Evidence Heard in 1917 by the Extraordinary Investigation Commission of the Provisional Government, Vol. III, Leningrad, 1925, p. 85.
[6] Archives of the Revolution and Foreign Policy. Files of the Department of Police, Special Register, No. 167, Part 56, folio 80.
[7] Ibid., Part 46, folio 71.
[8] Leaflet of the Russian Social-Democratic Labour Party, St. Petersburg Committee, “To the Proletariat of St. Petersburg,” 1916.
[9] Archives of the Revolution and Foreign Policy. Files of the Secret Police, No. 27, 1916, folio 73.
[10] The State Duma. Fourth Assembly. Fifth Session. Stenographic Report, Petrograd, 1916, column 68.
[11] Ibid., column 134.
[12] Ibid., column 38.
[13] Ibid., column 38.
[14] Ibid., columns 12-13.
[15] Ibid., column 69.
[16] Ibid., column 286.
[17] “The Privy Council, Meeting of November 22,” Russkoye Slovo (Russian Word), No. 270, November 23, and No. 274, November 27, 1916.
[18] “Congress of the United Nobility,” Russkoye Slovo, No. 275, November 29, 1916.
[19] V. P. Semennikov, The Monarchy on the Eve of the Collapse. Papers of Nicholas II and Other Documents, Moscow, 1927, p. 9.
[20] Maurice Paléologue, La Russie des Tzars pendant la Grande Guerre, 21 ed., Paris, Librairie Plon, Vol. II, p. 264.
[21] Sir George Buchanan, My Mission to Russia and Other Diplomatic Memoirs, London, Cassell & Co., 1923, Vol. II, pp. 18-19.
[22] Maurice Paléologue, La Russie des Tzars pendant la Grande Guerre, 20 ed., Paris, Librairie Plon, Vol. III, p. 159.
[23] The State Duma. Fourth Assembly. Fifth session. Stenographic Report. Petrograd, 1916, Column 258.
[24] Letter of December 14, 1916.—Trans.
[25] Letter of April 17, 1915.—Trans.
[26] Fall of the Tsarist Régime. Stenographic Report of the Interrogation and Evidence Heard in 1917 by the Extraordinary Investigation Commission of the Provisional Government,” Vol. VI, Leningrad, 1926, pp. 341-2.
[27] Ibid., Vol. IV, Leningrad, 1925, p. 61.
[28] V. P. Semennikov, The Monarchy on the Eve of the Collapse, 1914-17. Papers of Nicholas II and Other Documents, Moscow, 1927, p. 228.
[29] Ibid., p. 238.
[30] Ibid., p. 239.
[31] Ibid., p. 98.
[32] O. Czernin, Im Weltkriege (In the World War), Berlin, Ullstein, 1919, p. 192.
[33] “The Liquidation of a Conspiracy. M. I. Tereshchenko on General Krymov,” Russkiye Vedomosti (Russian Bulletin), No. 202, September 3, 1917.
[34] P. N. Milyukov, History of the Second Russian Revolution, Vol. I, Book 1, Sofia, 1921, p. 36.
[35] Fall of the Tsarist Régime. Stenographic Report of Interrogation and Evidence Heard in 1917 by the Extraordinary Investigation Commission of the Provisional Government, Vol. VI, Leningrad, 1926, p. 278.
[36] Sir George Buchanan, My Mission to Russia and Other Diplomatic Memoirs, London, Cassell & Co., 1923, Vol. II, p. 41.
[37] Ibid., p. 51.
[38] Archives of the Revolution and Foreign Policy. Files of the Petrograd Secret Police, No. 525, 1917, folio 36.
[39] Ibid., folio 28.
[40] Archives of the Revolution and Foreign Policy. Files of the Department of Police, Special Register, No. 167, Part 13, folio 29.
[41] “Arrest of the Labour Group,” Russkiye Vedomosti Special Supplement, No. 24, January 30, 1917.
[42] “The Public Organizations,” Utro Rossii, No. 28, January 28, 1917.
[43] Central Archives. The Bourgeoisie on the Eve of the February Revolution, Moscow, 1927, p. 183.
[44] “Speech by A. F. Kerensky,” Ryech (Speech), No. 47, February 19, 1917.
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